Friday 4 January 2013 07.45 EST
First published on Friday 4 January 2013 07.45 EST

When Janice Hutt, a New Hampshire nurse, went to prison to serve a 10-year sentence for stealing someone's identity and cash, she probably didn't realize that in addition to this prison term, she was effectively being sentenced to a lifetime of poverty and unemployment.

In addition to Hutt, the three other plaintiffs in the case, Danielle Woods, Martha Thibodeau and Michelle Vanagel, each represent a different failing of the prison system according to the filing. Woods is seriously mentally ill, Thibodeau has only an eighth-grade education and cannot read, Vanagel has substance abuse issues and Hutt, of course, needs job training. None of the women is receiving the services they need if they are to have any chance of a successful rehabilitation.

The disparity in services offered to male and female prisoners in the state is outlined in graphic detail in a disturbing 2011 report (pdf) by the New Hampshire Advisory Committee to the US Commission on Civil Rights. According to the report, the main men's facility in Concord contains:

"An educational floor with a library and nine classrooms, a chapel, mental health services offices and treatment group rooms, a warehouse, maintenance shops, an indoor gymnasium with an attached hobby craft area and several shops providing industrial and vocational training activities, including automotive, autobody, building trades, culinary arts, business education, computer education, intro to the workforce and power mechanics."

In stark contrast, the women's prison at Goffstown is a single-story building wrapped in razor wire, with limited outdoor space, that operates at approximately 120% capacity and is so cramped and overcrowded that the women have to eat in shifts. More tellingly, according to the report, "the space devoted to industry is a small portion of a single room for a handful of sewing machines. There is no space for vocational training beyond limited computer access for basic training in word processing and data entry." The space for drug treatment is not being utilized due to lack of staff and the mental health facilities are virtually non-existent.

This enormous disparity in rehabilitative services on offer to women, no doubt, contributes to the fact that New Hampshire can boast the dubious distinction of being one of the only states in the union where the rate of recidivism among female convicts exceeds that of men. In 2005, the recidivism rate for women was at an unprecedented high of 56%, compared to 49% for men. Although the rates for both sexes have decreased since that time, the male rate has dropped by over 10%, while the female rate has dropped by only 8.8%.

These are not good numbers, but it's not hard to see why women fare so poorly upon release when you consider that 64% of women in state prisons (pdf) do not have a high school diploma, that approximately 74% have substance abuse issues, that 57% report having been physically or sexually abused prior to incarceration and that almost a quarter (or many more, according to some studies) suffer from a psychiatric disorder. Expecting these women to miraculously get their acts together and to emerge from prison fully functional and ready to face the world when they have been denied the most basic rehabilitative services is ridiculous and counterproductive – as the extremely high rates of recidivism among women prisoners in New Hampshire clearly demonstrate (pdf).

New Hampshire is not exactly an outlier when it comes to treatment of incarcerated women. Lawsuits have been filed in several states on behalf of female prisoners, including, currently, Montana, Virginia, Florida and Hawaii, alleging unequal treatment. The New Hampshire state legislature has distinguished itself, however, for its persistence. The battle for equality for incarcerated women in that state has been raging for over two decades, since the first court order demanding parity for female prisoners was issued in 1992. That order has more or less been ignored. One can only hope that, for the sake of the taxpayer who has to foot the bill for the repeated prison stays, if not for the prisoners themselves, this latest court challenge will force the legislators' hands.